Gioia dell'amore
by Annaliesmarie99
Summary: Kahoko looks upon her life so far. SEQUEL to 'Liebesfreud'.


**Gioia dell'amore**

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**Inspiration: **I was inspired to write this fic by naomiyuraki08's review to my other one-shot. Her idea stuck in my mind, and this is the outcome. Hope you enjoy it!

**Recommendation: **The song that I think fits this fic is Andrea Bocelli's _Le tue parole. _I wrote this fic while listening to it and I think it would suit it while reading as well. Besides, everyone knows I am mad about that guy. ;p

**Dedication: **I usually do not like to dedicate my fics to anyone, because it is dedicated to everyone who reads my story. But I am dedicating this story to **C. Isabel**. She is sort of like my beta reader, in the sense that her reviews have helped me improve as a writer. And she is one of the most fabulous people I have ever met—not in person, but wish to do that one day. Your mails light up my day truly. This is for you.

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The sea breeze messed up her long red unbound hair, but she didn't have a care in the world for that fact. It soothed her frailed nerves and calmed her mind—that is what she truly cared for.

Life had never been easy to Kahoko; for she had to bear a lot of things from when she was younger. Going along with people's wishes was something that made her feel oppressed, yet sometimes she had no option but to accept it for what it was.

Music had liberated her soul. When she first ran into Lili and was forced to accept the magical violin, she took it for nothing more than a nuisance. But she started to enjoy playing, to the point that she forced herself to look beyond her assumptions of her level of playing, and tried to do everything realistically possible to reach upto the level of the other participants. When the strings snapped in the third selection, upon Lili's explanation to the happening, she felt guilty for treating her violin such, not sparing a care for it's 'feelings', and subsequently went through a period of angst. The violin is truly the only thing that gave her so much love, and her parting from it had been short.

She always cherished the time she spent in the concours, and was grateful that she had been able to form bonds that would last a lifetime. Some of them, beautiful and unbreakable, while some others, well, bittersweet would be the best word to describe it.

Her bond with Ryoutaro had been more like that of siblings, even though she realized later on that he did not feel brotherly towards her in the beginning and had accepted that he would never be anything more than that to her.

Keiichi had been like a younger brother, but he had also been the one to give her honest feedback, not clouded by their friendship, and sound advice, when she needed it. She learnt dedication to music from him.

Shouko, like Keiichi, had been like a younger sister to her, and even though she was timid, she had always been nice to Kahoko, and had even looked upto her as a person and as a performer.

Kazuki had taught her to love music, and she had always felt energized on hearing his performances. She always looked at him as a fun person, happy and outgoing, and someone who could light up any situation.

Azuma was a different story altogether. When she first met him, she took him to be a helpful and kind senpai, exactly what he wanted her to believe. But when she beat him to place second in the second selection, she got to see what he was really like. To tell the truth, firstly, she was scared, but after she posed as his fiance she realized the pressure he was in always to be perfect, for his family's honour. Her aversion to him slowly dissapeared, even though she did not prefer to be alone with him, as he took advantage of every opportunity possible to embarass her and get a rise out of her, just for fun.

Len had been the one to teach her about the violin and had taught her to love it and the music that it produced. They had embarked on a relationship right before he was to leave for Europe, and though it was difficult, they had managed to pull it off—or so they thought.

When she went to perform in Europe as a part of the group from Seiso Daigaku, they had met up. But the relationship was strained. His sole focus on music took away his attention from his relationship. Kahoko sensed his increasing closeness to Miyaji and they mutually broke it up. She returned heartbroken, but swore never to expect anything from life. It is better to live frugally on surprises than expecting things over which she had no control.

When she met Azuma at a charity concert four years after her graduation from school, she was astounded to find him looking even more devilishly handsome than before. He had always been good looking, even in school, but age had defined his features better. She was happy for him, that he had been able to follow his heart's desires. After the concert, he had asked her out.

She had been shocked to say the least, but she agreed nonetheless. She found the joy of being with someone again. She still remembered their first kiss. It had been on the very beach where she was standing presently, and on a spring day.

They were walking along the shores, Kahoko's slippers in one hand and the other hand in Azuma's, her bare feet being bathed in the cool sea breeze. She was giggling, the water tickling her feet. Azuma suddenly whispered in her ears, "Enjoying yourself, Kaho? Though, I think I can make you enjoy yourself a bit more." She shuddered at his tone, still not used to his shows of affection, and turned to look at him as he slipped his arms around her waist. She looked him up from the feet up before meeting his gaze.

He was dressed in office attire; even though he was allowed to pursue music, he had to take care of the business to a certain extent. She was dressed in a simple spaghetti strapped white dress that ended at her knees. A silver watch on her left wrist, diamond earrings and a scarf pulling up her hair into a messy ponytail completed her look. As she looked into his eyes after looking him over, he slipped his hand in her hair and pulled off the scarf, letting her hair tumble like a waterfall over her back.

He smiled at her wickedly and captured her lips in his. He slowly rubbed the small of her back, making her gasp. He took advantage of her preoccupation with his hand's position and slipped his tongue into her mouth, exploring the crevices. The fact that she had pulled her arms around his neck was an indication that she was loving it as much as he was.

He gently ran his hand over her body, feather light touches indicating what was coming next, yet not giving in completely to the pleasure. A few minutes later when they broke off, he kissed her on the cheek and rested his forehead against hers. But that moment lasted for a few seconds, as she pulled his head down for another make out session.

The present Kahoko let out a small laugh as she remembered the incident and watched the sunset. "Who makes out on their first kiss?" she murmured aloud, closing her eyes, letting the cool waves caress her feet and her mind.

"I doubt you would have asked for the second kiss had we not." A voice came from behind her. Before she could turn, she felt arms wrapping her from behind and a kiss being planted on her cheek.

"Hmm, I guess you are right about that—" She could barely finish her sentence as she felt her lips being crushed by his. She closed her eyes and put her hands over his as he deepened the kiss.

"Buonasera, Kahoko." Azuma murmured, looking into the her golden eyes, as he rubbed her swollen belly gently.

She giggled at his actions, pecked at his lips while leaning back into his shoulder and said, voice as soft, "Buonasera, Azuma."

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**Author's Note****: **Did you like it? I hope you did. Naomiyuraki08 suggested that I should write Liebesfreud from Kahoko's point of view. I am not that fond of POV stories, but then I thought that I should give it a shot. The weird thing is that ALL fanfic ideas come to me before exams and results and such. On cue, I have an English placement exam at a university tommorow. Though I am prepped up for it, done with the history of English literature and all, but still it can be quite distracting with this at such a time. I was initially planning on writing tommorow but it can be quite disconcerting to feel restless with ideas swimming around in my hand. So here is the result of all that restlessness. :p

I am not planning on making a chaptered fic on La Corda anytime soon, because I am already working on a Clamp School Detectives chaptered fic, and I know that I will not be able to handle two chaptered fics at the same time. But you can expect one shots of La Corda from time to time.

"Buonasera" is Italian for "good evening" and "gioia dell'amore" means "love's joy", the same meaning of Liebesfreud in German.

I better stop before my note becomes a chapter all by itself. (^_")

Do let me know how you liked it. All constructive criticism is welcome, flames, however, are not.

Happy reading, everyone! (n_n)


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